How about Muslims? There may be a problem with the perception of the “religion of peace” as being a threat. Seems it’s not too peaceful to lop off heads, burn people alive in cages, throw folks you don’t like off tall buildings, blow up groups of people as well as themselves, shoot masses of innocent people while they are trying to enjoy a party or concert. Yes, there are people who commit these atrocities in the name of Islam. But are they really Muslims?
There is an identity for people like this; it’s called a cult. One definition in the Oxford American dictionary for a cult is; a relatively small group of people having religious beliefs or practices regarded by others as strange or sinister. Yep, these radical “Muslim” groups fit that description quite nicely. They have hijacked an entire religion for their own nefarious purposes. It’s what cults do.
Some of the worst cults have a messianic leader – Jim Jones on Guyana; David Koresh, Branch Davidians; Charlie Manson; Shoko Asahara; Marshall Applewhite; Luc Jouret; and Joseph Di Mambro; the list goes on and keeps growing. In recent times, we could easily add Osama Bin Laden of Al Qaida, Mullah Omar of the Taliban, the late Abubakar Shekau of Boko Haram currently replaced by Mahamat Daoud, Hassan Nasrallah of Hezbollah and now Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi of ISIS (or ISIL of Daesh).
This is not a complete list and it seems to grow constantly. It is also not exclusively a Muslim membership, although Islam is the most recent religion hijacked for destructive cults these days. Followers of Charlie Manson believed he was the second coming of Jesus Christ. Jim Jones also used the Christian bible to entice members into his cult.
In 1984, Joseph Di Mambro and Luc Joret formed the Order of the Solar Temple based loosely on Rosicrucians and Knights Templar. They succeeded in convincing their followers that an environmental apocalypse was coming and to escape it members needed to be “transformed” by fire to ascend to a planet orbiting Sirius.
In 1997, the Prophet Marshall Applewhite of the Heavens Gate cult convinced its 39 members that the Hale-Bopp comet would bring a UFO to rescue them from the “end of times.” They all draped themselves in purple cloaks and drank poison believing they would be raptured.
Aum Shinriko was a cult formed in Japan during the ‘90s. They released deadly sarin nerve gas into a Tokyo subway tunnel in 1997. The group’s leader Shoko Asahra preached that the end of the world was near and his followers would be the only ones to survive.
The Daesh (ISIS/ISIL) cult has also convinced the followers of the caliphate that the apocalypse is imminent. They use Sharia law, which isn’t any sort of codified law, and only consists of what the Caliph and his henchmen say is the law, to intimidate, regulate, and in effect oppress their followers exactly like every other cult has throughout history.
The cult of the Daesh is not the Islamic faith nor is it consistent with the Quran any more than followers of Jim Jones or Charlie Manson were Christians following the tenets of the Bible.
It is always easy to paint groups with a wide brush, and maybe I have been guilty of this on occasion, but that doesn’t make it right. The cults that have perverted the Muslim religion do not represent or speak for that religion. They are a tragic aberration of an old and noble religion.
So, what do we do to protect our families and ourselves? Vigilance and, dare I say it, profiling. We know there are no Christians in ISIS. Don’t look for the next terrorist killings to come from people going to churches. We do know that ALL of the recent terror plots have originated from people who believed themselves Muslims.
Note, however, I did not say to judge them. Just because a person prays five times a day and goes to a mosque does not mean he or she is a terrorist. If they are stockpiling military style weapons, massive ammunition, and explosives, this could be a good indication of possible trouble. Alert the authorities. If they are spouting hateful doctrine against America or other religions, they might be worth having authorities investigate.
Again, note that I don’t advocate taking action against these people. Who knows, he or she might just be opinionated columnists.
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